Send us a blindfold, send us a blade
Tell the survivors help is on the way
I was a blindfold, never complained
All the survivors singing in the rain
I was the one with the world at my feet
Got us a battle, leave it up to me
Metric (Fantasies)
"Good God, Helen, what did you do? Finagle with some barbed wire or something?" says the white-coat before her.
Helen shrugs; her effort at nonchalance not quite convincing. "It's that jujitsu class..." she manages to mumble out, eager for the subject to be dropped. Well technically, it would be quite a relief to get everything off her chest. A lengthy confession regarding her nocturnal activities would serve her better than anything the good doctor could prescribe. But the best way to keep a secret, as her mother had always told her, is to keep your trap shut. It's the best kind of insurance. Maybe mother was right after all.
The good doctor snorts. "Jujitsu, my ass. I'm not an idiot, Helen. Humour me – just this once." The woman pauses, waiting. Helen stares blankly at her physician, mute. The doctor continues, throwing her hands up in the air in helplessness. "Okay, fine. Don't tell me. But the next time you come in here with a grazed shoulder – and it looks like it's the work of dodged bullet, mind you – yes! A bullet! I told you I'm not an idiot,"
"It could have been a knife," offers Helen in a small voice.
"Knife, bullet – it doesn't matter. What I would like to know is what an academic like yourself is doing; to be caught up in knife and gun fights like this. Do you have an abusive boyfriend or something?"
Helen's face puts on that inscrutable mask again, before contorting into fully fledged amusement. She breaks out into a heavy roll of chuckles, tears beginning to stream at the edges of her eyes. The doctor watches her patient carry on like for several moments before stepping back and nodding; unsure as to whether she should be offended or relieved. Finally, she settles on an emotional blend, smiling – yet not quite content at the belief that Helen was having a good joke at her expense.
"Alright. Alright. I had to speculate." remarks the doctor.
"Well, what did you think I was doing? Capering around Gotham at night? You're not gonna say I'm the Green Lantern now, are you?" Helen stymies a surging guffaw. "Oh come on, Susan, just patch me up. I have a class at noon, and this is just a scratch. You know it, and I know it."
"It's one of many scratches, Helen," rebuts Susan, not quite ready to relinquish her hold.
Helen rises from the green bed-of-analysis, as Susan often likes to refer to it, and starts to put on her brown corduroy jacket. "Well, it looks like I'll have to get rid of my schizophrenic cat then." She shakes her head. "Damned thing must think it's some kind of sculptor. And I'm the clay."
"You're allergic to cats," states Susan, her voice a monotone.
Strapping on her purse, Helen tucks a graying strand of hair behind her ear, and looks off into the distance, pondering. "Oh...you're right there. Well, I have to be off, Suze. Thanks for putting up with the last minute check-up – see you soon."
"I hope not. For your sake," mutters Susan, just as Helen shuts the door behind her.
As she walks into the office's waiting room, their departmental secretary glances up and smiles. The grin is short-lived, however, as the woman hands Helen her mail.
"I need the final exams, Dr. Grant," she says. She moves aside a potted poinsettia, its pot wrapped in overly-gaudy pink foil, so as to make eye-contact with the older woman.
Helen grimaces. "Was that this week? But the finals aren't until next week!" she exclaims.
The secretary gives Helen a patronizing look. The gesture is still patient, however. "I need to make copies. It was posted on the notice-board two weeks ago," And to prove her point, she rises from her small chair, shuffles awkwardly around the booth, and points to the used board with her well-manicured fingernails. Neatly tacked right to its center lies a yellow sheet; its message typed boldly and clearly: All finals exams are to be turned into the head office by December 13th, to be distributed during finals week accordingly.
Helen shifts from foot to foot uncomfortably. She never was one to balance facets well. "Oh gosh, Bernie, I forgot." She looks mortified and more than a little embarrassed.
Bernie sighs – perhaps this is an all-too-common ritual – in various aspects of her life. She is the mother of three children, after all. "It's alright. Just e-mail me the rough draft, and I'll try to polish it up for you."
Helen grits her teeth, lifting her eyes up sheepishly. She seems prepared for considerable admonishment. "Rough draft?"
Bernie shoots her a look: are you kidding me? But she's much too polished and civil to spell it out. "How about you turn it in to me by the end of the week, then?" she says instead.
"End of the week? Yes, yes, that sounds great. When is – "
"December the seventeenth, Dr. Grant. It's a Friday. That gives you two days." interjects Bernie. "Here's your mail," the woman hands her a small stack of mail followed by a the morning's newspaper, "...and your daily news."
"I – uh, thanks, Bernie. For the extension. I don't – "
Bernie is already back at her designated post, dutifully carrying on with her activities. Without looking up from her work, she says, "Don't mention it, Helen. That's what I'm here for."
Helen smiles and walks into her office, shutting the door behind her.
Earlier that morning
GCPD
A hubbub of activity surrounds the main office; the shuffling of paper, the clacking of keys on computers, the incessant rolling rings of various telephones. Every instrument plays their part in this eccentric symphony, but it's simply white noise that filters through to each pair of ears in the large room. Every odd hour or so, a raving loon in handcuffs makes his debut, but save for his arresting officers, no one pays much notice. The desk officers sit buried in mounds of paperwork – their intermissions dominated by summons from their angry captain, or other harried detectives.
Two police officers sit outside the captain's room today, tired and worn. The first, a Sergeant Dillon, leans over his knees – hands clasped out in front of him. The second, Officer McKean, rests his head against the cold wall behind him. They've been waiting for over twenty minutes now, and Officer McKean's head tilts unconsciously to a side, the lull of sleep ever-present; even amidst the noisy racket of the local office orchestra. Finally, the captain's door opens, and a portly man steps out. Dillon is the first to rise from his seat, and spotting him, the captain beckons for him to enter. Dillon quickly rouses his companion, and the two stride into the quieter room, shutting the door behind them.
The captain wastes no time in cutting past pleasantries. He holds up a thin dossier. "Is this thing accurate?" he asks, referring to the report the pair had made regarding their most recent arrest.
Dillon, the braver of the pair when it comes to dialog with his superiors, speaks up first. "Yes, sir. We got to the scene probably twenty – thirty minutes after."
"So the perps were knocked unconscious by an already unconscious man, was that it?"
Dillon doesn't like where this is going, but there's no fixing anything; that's what he and McKean had written in their report anyway. "Yes sir. There was no evidence of anyone else in the house."
The captain shuffles through the papers in the file as he speaks. "Since when did you make detective, Sergeant Dillon?"
"I'm sorry sir, I don't get you," mumbles a confused Dillon. His partner, McKean, shuffles uncomfortably beside him. He quickly places fidgeting fingers behind his back.
"When did you make detective?"
"I didn't, sir. I'm a sergeant."
The captain does an effective job of feigning ignorance, and a downright awarding impression of innocent pretense. "B-but, I thought that since you effortlessly reconstructed the crime scene, you must be a detective!"
Dillon and McKean don't know what to say. Sergeant Dillon stares blandly at his captain. McKean, through weariness or an appreciation for macabre humour, manages to morph an oncoming grin into a short yawn.
Emphatically jerking an index finger their way, the captain's act dissipates instantly, only to be replaced by reddening anger. "You do not make assumptions like this on the freakin' job unless we pay you do make assumptions. And boy, we ain't paying you. Because of your completely classless thesis here," the captain waves the report in the air vigorously, "we've missed a good opportunity to catch our whacked out vigilante." The captain regards his underlings for several moments before issuing a defeating, dramatic sigh. As he walks towards his desk, he resumes unleashing his reprimands. "How on earth did you two morons string this together without consulting Officer Mitchell anyway? He's still in the ICU at St. Harper's, and to my knowledge he's unconscious and in no condition to be entertaining visitors. So how did you two geniuses do it? Did you use a psychic medium? Did you consult Madame Gabor on that 1-800 number? Tell me, please, 'cos I would really like to know,"
Dillon takes a tentative step forward. "I'm sorry, sir. I – it was late, and we were tired. We – uh, assumed that since the two suspects were knocked unconscious, and Officer Mitchell was on the scene already – "
"Officer Mitchell was downstairs. The two perps were lying unconscious in the study upstairs." interjects the captain. "Did you think that Officer Mitchell had an out-of-body experience and maybe assaulted them with the power of his mind?"
"No sir. We thought that maybe Mitchell shot them down in the scuffle, and tried to make his way downstairs before he lost consciousness,"
The captain turns his eyes up towards the ceiling, as if appealing to the heavens for help. And sanity. His eyes quickly come to rest on the pair. "So you're a medical examiner now too? The perps were not shot! Not even once, or twice! They were taken down by someone else! And now, thanks to you two, we've lost the chance of apprehending this lunatic vigilante bat!"
"The Batman?" speaks McKean, for the first time during this one-sided inquisition. "I thought he's not real,"
"He isn't real!" shouts the captain. "He only thinks he's real – parading around in that circus costume. He's gonna be a real problem; he's not operating under the guidelines of the system. He thinks he's justice. And if he's gonna function like that, what happens if his neighbour pisses him off? What happens if the lady in the store cuts in line in front of him? Do you see where I'm going with this?"
A knock sounds behind the office door. The noise abruptly ends the captain's rant, but his anger has far from subsided. "Come in!" he exclaims, in a strained voice.
An unassuming face peers around the door. A mustached man with glasses glances between the two officers and the captain. The intelligent eyes quickly surmise what has been going on, and the voice speaks, apologetic. "Captain Munroe, I'm sorry. Didn't know you were in the middle of – "
"It's okay, Jim," says Munroe. He throws a scathing look in Dillon's and McKean's direction. "You two – get out of here. I want you to go back to that report and re-write everything that actually happened. And if I see a hint – and I mean even one line – of commentary in that write-up, I'm gonna sit you both at the desk until you're ready to collect pension. You got that?"
The pair nod in hurried agreement, and leave Munroe's office thankfully. The mustached gentleman walks in, and the captain gestures for him to sit down.
"You want a drink, Jim?" he asks – formalities barred for the time being, nodding in the direction of his makeshift liquor cabinet. "I got some scotch the wife missed,"
Lieutenant Gordon smiles. The captain is completely at ease with him; he owes Gordon a lot. He also realizes that he wouldn't be here, even to hold so simple a meeting, without the likes of the lieutenant. His gratitude is adamantine. After all, getting through AA meetings is a remarkable feat altogether. But getting through them anonymously – regardless of the renowned intervention program's name – is a formidable task all on its own. Had Internal Affairs caught wind of Munroe's throes with alcoholic oblivion, there would have been no more Force, no more Captain – period. He needed to get away from the bottle, but he was inadvertently skilled in implying that the bottle always made its way to him. And so, it took a man of considerable character to step up to the plate, to throw away the vodka and bourbon, and to drive him home on the nights where his driving could constitute involuntary manslaughter. In other words, it took a man like James Gordon to wean him off the indelible drink.
So yeah, he was grateful.
"Thought you liked your coffee black; not laced with alcohol," comments Gordon, his eyes wrinkling at the edges.
"Gotta cave in once in a while, Jim. Occupational hazard and all that," mutters Munroe.
Gordon jerks his thumb behind him. "You mean those two rookies? Come on, Alex. Don't you remember being them – even at one point in your life? You especially – I mean, you must've given your lieutenant a coronary!"
The captain sits down in his seat, musing. He chuckles softly. "Yeah. How I got to be this old – I'll never know."
Gotham does that to you, recognizes Gordon. It has its ways. "Ah, never mind. A little berating won't hurt 'em. Toughens them up." They'll need it.
Munroe quickly shakes off the nostalgic reverie. "Yeah, yeah. Anyway. I wanted you to check into something for me. You saw that loon that set fire to that building downtown, didn't you?"
The Batman didn't start the fire. The SWAT team that was trying to kill him managed that all by themselves. And he saved my son from falling to his death. "Yeah. I did."
"Seems like he might've foiled a robbery-in-progress too." begins the captain.
And that's a bad thing – how? "The one that Office Mitchell was injured in, right? Yeah, I took a look at the report. You think it might be him?"
Munroe gives a slight nod. "Maybe. I mean, if we're lacking in one thing, it's a consistent M.O. Even the Green Lantern has one. Hell, anyone can see the Green Lantern coming a mile away, anyway. Can't be him. But this bozo – helpful or not – is going down a dangerous path. Vigilante justice is a vice only Hollywood can afford, but it should end there, Jim. If the people start idolizing this guy, we've got a real problem on our hands. First they idolize him, yeah? Then they imitate. And then we've got a whole gang of vigilantes on our hands." He stops to take a sip of his scotch, and then waves his hand in the air dismissively. "Forget flattery and imitation. Forget his following. What if we – if someone, anyone – pisses this nut job off? What do we do? I don't know about you, but we've got enough scum like our resident mafia to deal with, let alone one guy who thinks he's the lone ranger,"
Time to stick up for something, Jim. "He doesn't strike me as altogether impulsive..." offers Gordon weakly. Almost immediately, he's ashamed of himself. Ashamed for not standing up for what this Batman represented.
"Well, if he didn't give you that impression before, he will now." Munroe opens his drawer and pulls out a ziploc bag containing some paper. Opening the bag reveals the items to be a greeting card and a small, evenly-cut piece of paper. As Munroe pushes it towards Gordon, the lieutenant recognizes the open face of a playing card, the front depicting the colourfully ostentatious Joker character. Gordon is reluctant to pick it up, but Munroe gives him a nod of non-verbal assent. There were obviously no fingerprints to be identified. The lieutenant then opens the greeting card. As he reads it, his eyes widen.
"Well, what do you think? Think this Bat-fluff is experimenting with his M.O.?" asks the captain.
Gordon swallows nervously. Whoever wrote the card, whoever it was – it certainly wasn't Batman. It was a little too sadistic. But of course, Munroe fails to see that. "I don't think it's the same guy," says Gordon.
Munroe gives him a look of incredulity. "Are you kidding me?" He points to the joker card. "He's telling us what he's gonna dress up as next. And who his next victim is gonna be,"
"The Batman goes after criminals, Alex. This – this one is threatening the family of Gotham's patrons – its philanthropists. Batman wouldn't hit them. He wouldn't touch them." There, decides Gordon, that's better.
For a few moments, the captain regards the quiet man before him. They said that being a cop is fifty-percent detective work, and fifty-percent instinctual. For all the years and promotions that he had earned, the captain would unequivocally admit that Gordon was, by far, the better cop. Hell, he was the better man. Now some cops, they're ambitious. When a desk job isn't paying the bills, they want to be upped to patrol officer. When patrol officer doesn't bring in enough for the mild luxuries of life, working homicide and vice can really rack up good credentials necessary for advancement. Captain Munroe calls this a juncture of sorts; but this isn't a decision on whether to make detective is worth the trouble or not. It's never that trivial. Oh no, this is where a cop realizes why he's making detective; is it to accumulate tally marks representing each cracked case? It is to stroke their ego and to build a name for themselves? Or is it because taking each thug down means that another happy family is spared the criminal's wrath and envy?
It wasn't hard to figure out which category Jim Gordon was filed under.
That is why he likes him, after all. Sure, Gordon had been more than helpful when it came to helping the captain curb his drinking problem. But there was something else to the man. Something in him worth respecting. Worth paying attention to.
"You really don't think, then, that this card guy's the Batman?" asks Munroe, a little more willing now to consider an alternate possibility.
Gordon shook his head. "Look – between you and me – a vigilante this Batman may be. But he's not cold or crazy enough to do this," with that, the lieutenant holds up the greeting card, opens it and scrutinizes it again. His second evaluation doesn't dull the gravity of what he sees. Inside the card lies a snapshot of a family, dad, mum and son; all in ski suits, posing in front of the Alps. A happy vacation getaway. But their faces are grotesquely disfigured, the modified depictions sucking out the obvious high spirits from the original photo. Each face is crudely painted white, the hair; a painful neon green. But what cuts to Gordon the fastest is the boy's neck. A crimson red line slashes right through the demented caricature. Then, in the picture just below it is a Christmas tree; decorated with baubles – one in particular stands out. The boy's head hangs on a branch, grinning; with a blend of surreal horror. It's enough to make a parent sick. Heck, it's enough to agitate any sane individual.
But that wasn't the clincher. The garish words beneath the photo seals the deal for him. He closes his eyes after he re-reads them for the second time. This isn't the work of hit men, or even the most twisted of mob bosses. This seems to be the work of...a comedian gone wrong.
Gordon hands the card back to Munroe, who reads the text aloud, much to the lieutenant's discomfiture.
"I wish the most warmth and love to your family that the season can bring. May you decollate your home with good spirits and happiness." The captain looks up from reading. He seems drained. "Decollate. Well."
"Yeah."
"You know of any goombahs...or leaders of goombahs who prefer decapitation to clean-cut gunshot wounds?" Munroe knows the guess is a long shot, but he has to ask anyway.
"No. It's not the Estebans. It's not the Falcones. Family's off limits to them, remember?" states Gordon, well aware of a long-standing oath between mob broods to never involve family members in vendettas.
"Maybe not. Could be we got a full-scale war brewing in our hands," and as soon as he says it, he knows it's too far from the truth. "Hell, what am I saying? Who'd wanna hit the Williams? They've never interfered with any sort of politics, let alone the civics of mafia heads,"
"Don't forget that the target's a ten-year-old," reminds Gordon, as if Munroe needs reminding. The lieutenant jerks his head towards the now-shut card. "Did you send it down to forensics?"
"We got nothing on it, Jim. Nada. Prints came out clean. UV-tests came out clean. I did send copies down for a hand-writing analysis, though. Should get the results sometime today." explains the captain.
"I've never seen the likes of it in my life, Alex. The Williams' are loaded though, so my initial guess would be blackmail. Or a possible kidnapping. But blackmail usually comes with a list of demands, or instructions. And kidnapping – well, who sends threats before a snatching?" and then, as if an idea has suddenly struck him, he speaks up, worried. "You've alerted the parents, right? I mean, they know, don't they?"
Munroe rubs his tired brow. A small vein, right above his eye – unnoticeable, even to someone within close proximity – begins to twitch involuntarily. But he can feel its spasms. "Yes. They know. I told them to get out of the country for a while – you know, take an extended vacation."
"And...?" presses Gordon.
"They won't leave. Papa Williams says that he won't let himself, or his family, be bullied. No one has the right to tell them what to do. His words, of course. Thinks he's making some sort of statement. He asked me how seriously I was taking this threat – and whether our artist here seemed dangerous, or just annoying. I told him we didn't know – but that we need to take every threat seriously unless proved otherwise. So he puts his hand on my shoulder and tells me that I'm doing a damned fine job, and that with me and my men protecting Gotham from these criminals, he has nothing to worry about."
Gordon scoffs. The action does not imply incompetence on the behalf of GCPD, but it reflects an overall lack of faith in their intelligence and resources. The Force was severely outnumbered by their dark-sided counterparts. Criminals – from the petty crook to deranged serial killers, gun men and assassins – were crawling out of the woodwork. And more often than not, no one had ever heard of them before, and no record or rap sheet detailed previous convictions. So, no M.O.s meant no quick arrests. If there were arrests at all. Each day on the job seemed longer than the last.
And Munroe knew how bleak their situation looked. Boy, did he know. "I don't know what to do, Jim. The press haven't gotten wind of this, thank goodness. But if we get more...animations from this loon, I don't know how long I can keep a lid on it. Hell, we might even have to spread the word just so we can eke out a lead from somewhere."
Gordon disagrees. "Blowing the lid on it – that isn't the brightest of your ideas. Don't get desperate. At least, not yet."
"I got a strong feeling desperation's a breath away. We're in the dark as to the who's, why's and where's. We need something to go on,"
"I know. But we're not completely blind. Everyone leaves a trail, Alex. You know that," Gordon tries to sound reassuring – he's not doing a bad job of it.
Munroe leans forward in his seat and puts his hands onto his desk. "Will you handle the case?"
The question takes Gordon by surprise. Munroe is quite aware of his more kindly opinion of Batman, and is often reluctant to assign the lieutenant to cases that are plausibly linked to the so-called guardian. But it seems that his appreciation of Gordon's instincts surpass what Munroe views as misplaced trust.
Or maybe Munroe really is desperate.
"Are you sure?" queries Gordon. "Our perp may not be the man you're hoping for," warns the lieutenant, referring to Batman.
Munroe lets out a heavy sigh. "No, he may not be. But we're on the same team here. Gotta catch the bad guys. If this sick trick is a joke – we'll know, and there's no harm done save for the lack of a couple nights of sleep. But if it is serious..." here, his voice tapers off.
Gordon doesn't respond.
A/N (09/15/09):
For the unfortunate few who've stumbled across this story, thanks for taking the time to read it. Reviews are always appreciated. I'm planning on making this story shorter than my average fic, and the same goes for my chapters. I intend for the story to take place over a period of two weeks or so; and I'm hoping to create an atmosphere where the reader feels as if they're bystanders - and that things are happening in real time. It's a little different - stylistically - from what I'm used to writing, but I wanna stretch myself a little in this piece. Sometimes, I know, I probably suck at this, so if you disagree with the creativity angle I'm taking here, and if the characters/plots seem misplaced, feel free to let me know, but please be diplomatic about it.
Thanks again for reading!
